Worrying plethora of ipod type reviews

[Terryff]

Andrew Everard:
But in no way belittling what is very
obviously a very serious debate, and could change our lives forever -
just the entrenched, snappy views to which it gives rise.

Whose?

 

[Andrew Everard]

Terryff:Whose?

Not apportioning blame, but these threads are always guaranteed to get snappy and overheated.

 

[Anonymous]

Our aim is always to cover as many types of audio technology available - if we didn't, you'd never be reading about

CD players. And, if we're being honest, covering a broad range of tech means more people read the magazine, get excited about music and, this is the crucial bit, can see/hear all available options and vote with their ears. And let's not forget that we review more hi-fi than ever, online and in the magazine.

 

[Terryff]

Thanks for the great replies, i am now, as per Chebby's advice, going to look into lossless etc....but! What i am missing information about is how to get it off the pc, does a dedicated usb dac transport the sound directly, or does it have to come via the sound card? So does the sound card matter?

 

[John Duncan]

Sound card only matters if you're using it to play the audio. Generalising, a DAC will act as a substitute soundcard - either via USB or via optical digital out. Alternatively, you can wirelessly stream it to any number of clients - airport express, squeezebox, yadda yadda - all of these have a digital out which you can then feed into a DAC for optimal quality.

 

[Alec]

or you can get a relatively cheap soundcard (such as the m-audio 2496, tho others may be able to advise on even cheaper ones that can do the job) with digital outs, so that you can attach a DAC to teh pc.

 

[Terryff]

Just to add this into the mix, makes extremely interesting reading, though not too much of a surprise.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/17777619/the_death_of_high_fidelityÿ

 

[Alec]

Terryff:
Just to add this into the mix, makes extremely interesting reading, though not too much of a surprise.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/17777619/the_death_of_high_fidelityÿ

i read something similar a coule years ago. could have been the same article in fact, maybe the original magazine version.

imo, they could have tried to get audio samples of the same tracks mastered well, and heavily compresse. i mean, the article refered to that many remasters! Still.

Thanks for that.